A Swinger Of Birches
by tishathewriter
Summary: Robert Frost: "One could do worse than be a swinger of birches." When someone starts killing Yale students Harper's Island style, the team looks into it. Little does Reid know that his childhood friend resides on that campus.
1. Chapter 1

"It's surprising how much memory is built around things unnoticed at the time." -- Barbara Kingsolver.

* * *

_There was a boy walking down the street. He couldn't have been more than eight. He had glasses and a collared shirt, unusual for a child that young. He seemed to be thinking about something important, his face down, eyes studying the ground._

_"Spencer!" He heard his name and turned as a little girl came running down the street after him. "Wait!" So he waited until she caught up to him. "Where are you going?" she asked, out of breath._

_"Just walking. Do you want to come with me?"_

_"Yes!" she exclaimed, grabbing his hand, and they began walking toward a park. The girl was much younger than him, probably only about four. She had short black hair to her chin, her baby fat still obvious. She was wearing her favorite dress and sneakers._

_They walked in silence for a while, her small feet trying to keep up with his big steps. "Why are you sad?" She asked, looking up at him._

_"I'm not sad," he said, wrinkling his brow even more._

_"Yes you are, and don't do that, my daddy says your face will freeze that way someday." He was quiet for a while, but he stopped wrinkling his brow. "What's wrong, Spencer?"_

_"Nothing, Kina. I'll tell you about it when you're older." She looked at him. "When you're in sixth grade."_

_Her face fell, "But I'm only in... first grade! That's five years!"_

_"Yes, well... wait, you're in first grade? Since when?"_

_"Since September, silly. Mommy and Daddy said that I was too smart for preschool and kindergarten so they put me right in first grade!" She leaned in as if to tell him a secret. "And don't tell anybody this, but I'm the best artist in my class. Look," she pulled a piece of paper out of the pocket of her dress, "my people actually look like people. Not the stick figures the other kids draw." It was true, her drawing showed depth and shape rather than lines and two dimensions. This was unheard of for a child._

_"Wow Kina, that's really good."_

_"My teacher didn't seem to think so. She wouldn't let me show anybody and she made me sit out during arts and crafts." The boy just looked at her. He knew how much art meant to her._

_"Come on, let's get you home." They started walking in the other direction._

_The girl looked up at him. "Spencer, will you be my big brother?"_

_"I... can't really control... I mean..." He looked at her, his best friend. "Yes," he said, putting his arm around her shoulder like a protective sibling. She wrapped her arm around his waist, and they walked home, the sun setting behind them._


	2. Chapter 2

"Reid, man, wake up. We're almost there." Morgan shook the younger man awake.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm awake." Reid rubbed his eyes.

"Hey man, you're not still having those dreams, are you?" Morgan asked, referring to Reid's nightmares about his childhood.

"No, no... I'm not. Not anymore."

"That's good, man. People always say it's better to live for the future than dwell in the past."

"Actually... the dreams still are about my past. Just not about Riley Jenkins..."

"Really?"

"Yes... they uh... my dreams have been about my old friend, actually. She grew up down the street from me..." He trailed off, remembering.

Morgan grinned, "Come on, kid, we got work to do."

Hotch walked around the plane, handing out files. "These came in from the New Haven P.D. Someone has been killing people in the same way as the Harper's Island TV show. So far there's four people missing from the campus and four dead. One was found tied to the bottom of a boat, like the first victim on the show."

Rossi continued, "Another was found hanging from a beam in her dorm room with red dye injected in her eyes, like the fourth victim on the show. Yet another was found sliced in half at the same time one more was found cut up in the same lake the boat with the first victim was found. These last two were the eighth and the third victims on the show."

"Is the UnSub killing people in the order of the show?" Prentiss asked.

JJ answered, "We can't be sure. I've done some research on the show, and the day that the victims are killed isn't necessarily the same day that they're found."

"Those could be the missing people," said Reid.

"So this guy could be killing people in the same order as the show, but we won't know until we find them," Morgan said.

"Or him," Hotch added.

* * *

The plane landed and the team drove to the Yale campus where the dean of the college and chief of New Haven police were waiting. The campus was large and ancient-looking. The buildings were old, the main building still had pillars on it, but the dorms looked like new buildings. The dean was a short woman with shorter red hair, wearing a pinstriped skirt-suit combination. The chief of police was a rather large man, both in stature and waist-width, and balding. He stood with his hands on his hips and was wearing a light blue shirt rolled up at the sleeves. The team unloaded from their SUVs. They were walking to the office of the campus when suddenly Reid stopped.

"Morgan," he said, staring at someone a couple yards down the sidewalk, "hold this," and he passed his messenger bag off to Morgan as he started to run down the sidewalk.

"What? Reid... Reid!"

But Reid didn't hear him. All he could see was a girl. He didn't know what possessed him to do this. But he couldn't get over how much she looked like her. It had to be her. It had to be. She was wearing a long sleeve white shirt under a striped hoodie with the sleeves cut off and a pair of jeans so worn that the bottoms were just threads. She carried a cloth messenger bag with fringe on the bottom and rolls of paper sticking out, most likely posters from an art class. He was almost caught up to her now, soon he would find out if it was really her. All of a sudden she saw someone, a guy, and walked over to him. She wrapped her arms around him and they hugged. Reid stopped. If this was her, then there was no point.

He turned and went back to Morgan who was standing there with his bag. "What was that all about, man?"

Reid took his bag back. "Nothing. I thought I saw someone I knew."

"Who?"

"Nobody."

* * *

The killer pulled out his harpoon to sharpen it. He took aim, fired, and then pulled the rope, bringing the dummy back with it. The harpoon had gone straight through its midsection and out the other side. He smiled to himself, thinking of the next person's face when they saw the harpoon sticking out of their stomach.

* * *

The police chief began to speak as soon as they were in the building. "I told the FBI that we had this under control, but as soon as the third and fourth victims showed up, they sent you guys over no questions asked."

"Do we have any leads?" Hotch asked.

"One. It's also probably one of the reasons that you guys were involved. I've been told she's on the FBI's 'watch list.' Other than that, we have no reason to suspect her, or anyone else for that matter. Her name's Joaquina Mancuso. She's an English major, lives over in dorm B with a girl in her class."

There was a clear board in the middle of the room that looked like it could be a new version of the SmartBoard. It lit up, showing a girl's smiling face. They all glanced at the picture, but only Reid looked at it a second time. She had black hair cut to her shoulders, her hand was up by her face, in the middle of tucking her hair back from the gust of wind that had just blown. Her eyes were dark brown, almost black, her face was open and she was smiling like there wasn't a care in the world. Beneath her picture were pictures of the dead and missing students, but Reid could only look at the one of the suspect. He knew that picture. It was as familiar to him as his own two hands. He had taken that picture.

"Let's bring her in, see what she knows." Rossi sugested, and as they began to leave the room, Reid pulled Morgan aside.

"What is it, Reid?"

"That girl..."

"What, Reid?"

"Remember what I told you on the plane? About the girl who grew up down the street from me?"

"Yeah, man, but what does that have to do with any of this?"

"I saw her today... That was the person I was running after. That..." He pointed at the screen, "That's her."


	3. Chapter 3

"What?" Morgan asked, incredulous.

"That's my friend from when I grew up."

"I heard that. But... How do you know?"

"Well... after I went to college, we stayed in touch and we would visit each other on occasion... That's when I took this picture."

"Wait, wait, hold up. You took this picture?"

"Yeah..." Reid looked down.

Morgan almost smiled. "If this wasn't so serious man, I'd congratulate you. I never thought you could get a girlfriend."

Reid looked up, his mouth open in shock. "Morgan... This isn't a time for jokes."

"Right, right. I'll go... check out her information..." Morgan walked a bit away from Reid, dialing Garcia's number as he went. "Hey Mama, I have a favor... It's for Reid."

_"Well, anything to help my little genius out is fine by me."_

"Can you tell me what you find on a girl named Joaquina Mancuso? She's on the watch list."

_"Ooh, the watch list. Coming right up..."_ Morgan could hear the sounds of Garcia's furious typing over the phone. _"Looks like she was a child prodigy, not unlike our own. Her parents enrolled her in first grade when she was only four, she continued to excel in school, but never skipped a grade again. Her artwork was featured in a magazine when she was six, and oh my God, it is amazing! You have to see this, it looks like--"_

"Garcia?"

_"Oh, right... She grew up down the street from Reid, so I'm assuming that they were friends... Actually, it looks like they became more than just friends."_

"What'd you find?"

_"Letters... And e-mails... Mailed back and forth starting when she was eight and Reid was twelve... The year Reid went to college! Oh, my..."_

"What?"

_"Morgan, I feel bad reading this. I mean, it's obviously very private and..."_ She sighed, _"Well... I just want you to know that I didn't want to do this. Okay, so for the first six or so years it looks alright, just about how their lives have been and how much they miss each other and such... Then they get really good. Really mushy, lovey-dovey good. When she was fourteen and Reid was seventeen, almost eighteen, she goes to visit him at college. Looks like a school trip or something. After that, the letters change. They start talking about how much they love each other and don't want to spend their lives with anybody else. Apparently they visit each other sporadically over the next few years, until she turns eighteen, then the letters stop."_

"They stop?"

_"Well, they stop from Reid's end. The last one he wrote was for her to meet him so he could tell her something in person. Then there's about a four month break before she starts writing again."_

"What's it say?"

_"Along the lines of: 'Why can't we be together?' 'I could never find anyone like you...' 'I feel as though my sun has been extinguished...' 'Where did you go?' 'I thought...' "_

"Garcia? What is it, honey?"

_"Morgan... Reid started working for the FBI when he was twenty-two, did he not?"_

"Yeah, why?"

_"I think I know why the letters stopped... One says, 'I thought we were going to get married.' When she turned eighteen, Reid proposed. He didn't know that he'd be working for the FBI in four months. I'm guessing that since she was on the watch list, whoever hired Reid told him that they couldn't get married until they found out if she would be trouble. Morgan... They were gonna get married."_

Morgan looked over at Reid, who was looking at the file, shoulders hunched, a strange look on his face. "What happened after that?"

_"Nothing..."_

"Nothing? Come on, honey, there's gotta be something. What about her parents?"

_"Well, Reid joined our merry band, and as for Joaquina... There's nothing. Her parents split when she was fourteen over domestic violence issues... But I can't find anything on her. No pictures, no paper trail. Oh! Wait! Her tuition for Yale was paid in cash in full for her entire college years. She has her PhD. in Painting, Drawing, and Art Education. Looks like when our boy genius was busy getting his Ph.D.'s one at a time, this girl was triple majoring in art categories... You'll never believe this. Now she's back on campus, getting her PhD. in Literature, I can't tell what specific category, and she's actually teaching an art class. She has about sixteen students, one that hasn't shown up for the past two days."_

"Thanks, Mama."

_"No problem, hun."_

Morgan walked over to Reid, kneeling so they were eye to eye. "Talk to me, kid. Tell me about this girl."

* * *

"Hey, how was class?" Her roommate, Aurora, was in her Literature class, and had been her roommate for five years running. They had known each other for more than that, though, seeing as they both went to the same high school as well. They knew everything about each other, likes and dislikes, annoying things, and favorite things.

"Eh, it was good. Alex was absent again, so of course Lia couldn't pay attention at all, she was so worried. John is really improving, though. His painting this week is so much better than his earlier work. I think he's really coming out of his shell." Joaquina taught an art class on campus, and many of her peers were also her students.

"Oh, that's nice." Aurora snuck a glance at her roommate, "So I hear that the FBI are on campus..."

"Mmm..." Joaquina stared out the window that looked over the middle of the campus, the green lawn shone up at her, unnervingly bright.

"I wonder if--" Aurora stopped herself before she said, 'I wonder if Spencer's with them,' remembering how Joaquina never fully got recovered from the absence of the young doctor. "...I wonder if they're investigating the murders."

"I hope so. I hate not being able to sleep at night, thinking one of us could be next."

"I second that." Aurora paused. "Hey, do you wanna come get some lunch with me and Eric? I know you haven't seen him in a while."

"Actually, I saw him this morning. He was so happy to see me, too. I can't believe how big he's gotten. When I hugged him, it felt like hugging a giant."

"Well, you know my mom, she always feeds us kids so that we grow like beanstalks."

Joaquina laughed. "How about a rain check? I was gonna go over to the library and read a bit before class, maybe grade some of these paintings I've been carrying around."

"Sure, sure. Dinner? You've got to see how much Eric eats nowadays."

"Yeah, I'll go to dinner with you guys." When they parted ways at the entrance, Joaquina yelled after her, "Have fun with your brother! Don't terrorize him too much!"

"Oh I will!" Aurora yelled back. Joaquina laughed, and started walking to the library.

* * *

Reid was waiting behind a building. They were going to bring in Kina and he had to be a part of it. Emily was investigating the crime scenes and Morgan had muttered something about going to the library for something. He gulped, fingering his gun again. He also couldn't admit to himself that maybe, just maybe, he wanted to see her face again before he saw her in the interrogation room. He tried to think of statistics. They usually helped in situations like this, but he couldn't think of any statistics that said how many people arrested their childhood friend, the kid they grew up with, and brought her in for questioning.

He heard a buzz from his earphone, and then Hotch's voice, "Everybody ready? On three. One... Two... Three!"

On three, he whirled around the building, gun extended. He saw a crowd of policemen around a single girl, and lowered his gun. She still had her bag from this morning. He watched as an officer yanked her arms around to handcuff her. She looked up, and their eyes met. She was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her hair was a little shorter than in the picture, and her eyes were sadder, depressed looking. Her mouth was turned down at the corners. When she saw him, her eyes grew wide and her mouth dropped open. She gasped, "Spencer?" His face mirrored hers, eyes wide, mouth downtrodden. His mouth was grasping for the words, the statistics, the apology, that wouldn't come. He collasped on the sidewalk, his head in his hands, as they dragged her away.


End file.
